Thursday's Devotion

Thursday, April 16, 1998

The Son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and on the third day rise. (Luke 24:7 NRSV)

Some of the women had gone to the tomb to prepare the body with spices and ointments. Reaching the tomb, however, they found the stone rolled away. While they were trying to sift this through their minds, two men dressed in dazzling apparel appeared to them. The women were terrified and bowed their faces to the ground. The men asked them the most startling question in all of history, "Why do you seek the living among the dead? Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and on the third day rise."

The women remembered that Christ had spoken those exact words and they rushed to where the disciples were hiding and broke to them the most wonderful headline of all time: He is risen!

How did the disciples react? Luke tells us in verse 24:11, "But these words seemed to them an idle tale and they did not believe them." How's that for a conspiracy? Perhaps Lee Harvey Oswald was part of a conspiracy when he assassinated President Kennedy. Perhaps there are some suspicious circumstances surrounding the death of film star Marilyn Monroe. But it is ludicrous to conjecture as some have done that the disciples made up the story of the resurrection. As a man remarked gazing into the carved deeps of the Grand Canyon, "Something happened here!" And it did! Christ is alive!

Prayer: Dear Jesus, thank you for making something happen in my life. Amen.

Written by: Ronald Newhouse, Texas, USA

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